(a) Beginning with the 2018-2019 school year, if the local board of education is the authorizer of a charter school, then the local board shall receive an annual authorizer fee that is a percentage of the charter school’s per student state and local funding as allocated under § 49-13-112. The annual authorizer fee shall be the lesser of three percent (3%) of the annual per student state and local allocations or thirty-five thousand dollars ($35,000) per school.
Terms Used In Tennessee Code 49-13-128
Authorizer: means : (A) A local board of education, the Tennessee public charter school commission, or the achievement school district as defined in §. See Tennessee Code 49-13-104
local board of education: means the board of education that manages and controls the respective local public school system. See Tennessee Code 49-1-103
Public charter school: means a public school in this state that is established and operating under the terms of a charter agreement and in accordance with this chapter. See Tennessee Code 49-13-104
State: when applied to the different parts of the United States, includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
(b) The LEA shall use the annual authorizer fee exclusively for fulfilling authorizing obligations in accordance with this chapter.(c) If, for any school year, the total amount of authorizer fees collected by the LEA exceeds the amount used by the LEA to perform its authorizing obligations and responsibilities, the LEA shall distribute the amount remaining to its authorized public charter schools. The department shall develop a process to refund the unused fees to authorized public charter schools in the school year immediately following the school year in which the unused fees were collected by the LEA.(d) If the achievement school district (ASD) authorizes a public charter school under § 49-1-614, then the ASD must receive an annual authorizer fee of up to three percent (3%) of the public charter school’s per pupil state and local funding as allocated under § 49-13-112(a). By May 1 of each year, the commissioner shall set the percentage of a public charter school’s per pupil state and local funding that the ASD must receive as the annual authorizer fee for the next school year.(e) If the commission authorizes a public charter school under this chapter, then the commission must receive an annual authorizer fee of up to three percent (3%) of the public charter school’s per pupil state and local funding as allocated under § 49-13-112(a). By May 1 of each year, the commission or the commission’s designee shall set the percentage of a public charter school’s per student state and local funding that the commission shall receive as the annual authorizer fee for the next school year. Notwithstanding subsection (b), the commission may use the commission’s annual authorizer fee to fulfill obligations consistent with the authority of the commission as set forth in this chapter.(f) By December 1 of each year, each LEA that collects an annual authorizer fee shall report the total amount of authorizer fees collected in the previous school year and the authorizing obligations fulfilled using the fee to the department of education. The department shall create a standard document for the purposes of this report and shall post the information on the department’s website.
